Carving for Columbine

One Friday afternoon about 20 years ago, my kindergarten teacher announced that she couldn't carve the class jack-o-lantern as promised because she'd left her pumpkin carving knife at home. She was really sorry, and said she would carve it for sure on Monday, but everyone was still really let down. It was supposed to be the highlight of our week.

Being a thoughtful five year old and knowing that my teacher would probably forget to bring it again after a long weekend, the following Monday morning I decided to open up our kitchen utensil drawer at home to grab a steak knife and slip it into my backpack right before my mom told me to come into the living room so she could tie my shoelaces.

On the bus to school, there was this cute blondie who I always tried to sit across. To me, she looked like an angel. She was so blonde, her hair looked white. She was a first-grader I think. I had always wanted to talk to her but never found the courage to. But that day, feeling more confident than usual because of my self-righteous act of bringing a pumpkin carving knife for my teacher, I decided to finally introduce myself.

"Hi!" I said, leaning over. "My name is Peter."

And then I unzipped my backpack and pulled out my shiny steak knife and made sure to smile and said, "This is my knife."

The cute blondie sitting across from me, she was speechless. Her eyes grew large and her face turned whiter than her hair, so I began to feel a bit nervous. What could I possibly say? What could I possibly talk about? Colors... I decided to talk about colors.

Waving my knife around, grinning, I said, "My favorite color is red. What's yours?"

She started sobbing, so I put my knife back in my backpack and told myself not to let it bother me because, hell, no one gets it right the first time, not even Kirk Cameron from Growing Pains. I sagely figured it most likely wouldn't be the last time a girl would react that way when I introduced myself either.

All was forgotten as soon as I got off the bus and lined up where my class always lined up, right in front of the school doors. But, thinking about how grateful my teacher was going to be, thinking that she might even let me help carve the jack-o-lantern (!!!), I couldn't stay in line for long. I was just too excited, too eager. So I pulled out my knife again and ran inside the school, looking for my classroom.

The looks that teachers gave me as I briskly passed by their doors, knife in hand, biggest smile in the world, they were the same as the blondie on the bus. Eyes wide open, mouths agape.

As for the fourth and fifth graders that were there early, roaming the hallways to work on projects or whatever, they all screamed and backed up into their lockers.

I was so damn confused, but I kept on smiling and waving my knife around nonetheless.

All of a sudden, out of nowhere, these two fifth graders tackled me to the floor, knocking the wind out of me. "You're not going anywhere!" one of them hissed into my ear, and from my hands he peeled off the knife that I had brought for my forgetful teacher all because I wanted to see a jack-o-lantern, and as I was pinned to the floor I cried so hard because I just was so scared and so confused.

They took me to the fire-and-brimstone principal's office, and the principal was all, "WHERE DID YOU GET THIS KNIFE?!" and all, "WHAT WERE YOU PLANNING TO DO?!" I was terrified. Whenever people yelled at me when I was little, I would clam up, frozen in fear. So I pretty much just sat there, not saying a word, nervous and covered with sweat, until finally about a half hour later I loosened up and spooked everyone out by saying, "...My favorite color is red. What's yours?"

My parents yelled at me that night too, but of course, I was too scared to say anything, so they eventually gave up and just let me go to bed without getting any answers. What's funny is that I remember hearing a lot of panicked whispering going on in their bedroom before they turned off the lights and locked their bedroom door.

You know how a lot of the life anecdotes I write about are basically the same story of me having good intentions, but somehow always getting myself involved in unfortunate misunderstandings or embarrassing situations that make me look like an asshole? Like I'm a walking Three's Company episode?

Well, me with that "pumpkin carving knife", that marked the beginning of my life as an Asian George Costanza.

...

So I've just been chosen to represent my team in our office-wide pumpkin carving contest at work, and when the HR people handed me my pumpkin I started thinking about that particular childhood memory, and realized that I grew up having never bothered to explain myself to my parents -- that it was all just a big misunderstanding, that I was trying to be a good Samaritan for my teacher, that I just wanted to see a jack-o-lantern.

No wonder they get so nervous around me sometimes when I'm crabby.